Course Description: Empire affected the colonizers as well
as the colonized. We will look at how European thinkers from the Renaissance
through the early 19th century responded to the questions and challenges raised
by encounter and conquest in the New World, Africa, Ireland and Asia:
justifications of territorial sovereignty, concepts of race and cultural
difference, theories about luxury, trade, slavery, international law, the state of nature,
imperial decadence and imperial constitutions. Readings include primary sources, as well as
current scholarship and debate.
Requirements
- Six short
papers (2-3 pages each), to be handed in before class in the weeks of your
choice. At least three of these papers must be handed in before midterm
break. Papers are due Thursdays at 1:00
PM in my mailbox. The short paper might be a critical response to one book, or a
close reading of a primary source. It might be an attempt to relate one
week's reading to another week's reading, or an account of why you are
confused about something. Whatever you do, do not just summarize the
content of the readings.
- Participation
in the September 18 "choose a selection" assignment. If you put
your finding in writing, it counts as a short paper.
- Leadership
of class discussion on one of the assigned primary sources during course
of semester. Leader may, on consultation with the professor and plenty of
advance notice, change the assigned primary source reading.
- Final paper, 10-20 pages, analyzing one
source or comparing two sources (these may or may not be taken from
assigned readings.
Academic Integrity: You are highly encouraged to look
at Cornell's web-page on plagiarism (http://plagiarism.arts.cornell.edu/tutorial/logistics.cfm)
and to take their very enlightening quiz (http://plagiarism.arts.cornell.edu/tutorial/exercises.cfm),
from which even professors can learn. Needless to say, violations of Cornell's Code
of Academic Integrity will result in failing the assignment or failing the
course. The Code may be found at http://cuinfo.cornell.edu/Academic/AIC.html
Schedule of Readings
and Discussions
Note: "CS" means the book is available for
purchase at the campus store. "R" means it is on graduate reserve in
Olin Library.
Thursday, August 28: Introduction and Organization
Thursday, September 4
- Anthony
Pagden, Lords of all the World: Ideologies of Empire in Spain, Britain
and France
c. 1500-c.1800 [CS]
- Francisco
de Vitoria, "On the American Indians" (1539) in Anthony Pagden
& Jeremy Lawrence, eds. Vitoria: Political Writings [R]
Thursday, September 11
- Nicholas
Canny, "The Ideology of English Colonization from Ireland to
America,"
William and Mary Quarterly 1973 30(4): 575-598 [R]
- Edmund
Spenser, A View of the State of Ireland (1633) [R]
Thursday, September 18
- Roxann
Wheeler, The Complexion of Race: Categories of Difference in
Eighteenth-Century British Culture [CS]
- Choose
a selection found in Ania Loomba & Jonathan Burton, eds. Race in Early Modern
England: a Documentary Companion [R], or from any other source, and
present it to the class. Be prepared to discuss how well it fits Wheeler's
model.
Thursday, September 25
David Armitage, Ideological Origins of the British Empire [CS]
Thursday, October 2
Robert Travers, Ideology
and Empire in Eighteenth-Century India : the British in Bengal [CS]
Thursday, October 9
- Uday
Singh Mehta, Liberalism and Empire: A Study in Nineteenth-Century
British Liberal Thought [CS]
- Edmund
Burke, "Speech in Opening the Impeachment of Warren Hastings,
Esq." (1788) in David Bromwich, ed. On Empire, Liberty, and Reform [R]
Thursday, October 16
- Sankar
Muthu, Enlightenment against Empire [CS]
- Denis
Diderot, "Supplement to Bougainville's
Voyage" in Lester G. Crocker, ed. Diderot's Selected Writings
[R]. [Note: I will also put on reserve a translation of selections from
Raynal's History of the Two Indies].
Thursday, October 23
Sue Peabody, "There are no Slaves in France":
the Political Culture of Race and Slavery in the Ancien Régime
Laurent Dubois, "An Enslaved Enlightenment: Rethinking
the Intellectual History of the French Atlantic,"
Social History 31 (#1), pp. 1-14 [R]
Thursday, October 30
Christopher Leslie
Brown, Moral Capital: Foundations of British Abolitionism
Thursday, November 6
- Jennifer
Pitts, A Turn to Empire: The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain
and France [CS]
- Jeremy
Bentham, "The Influence of Time and Place in Matters of Legislation"
[R]
- [Note:
I will also put on Reserve James Mill's History of British India
and Pitt's edition of Tocqueville on Empire]
Thursday, November 13
Presentations of Research topics (or, if class is small,
French part of Jennifer Pitts, or whatever else the class chooses)
Thursday, November 20
Presentation of Research Topics
Thursday, November 27
(Thanksgiving—no class)
Thursday, December 4
Jeremy Adelman, Sovereignty and
Revolution in the Iberian Atlantic
Final Paper is Due
Monday, December 15